Tiltbed Trailors

Recommended Posts

So, last year I decided to spring for a trailer to haul my Z when taking my wife to out of town car shows.j If its just me i load what I need in the car and just take off but there is not enough room in the car for all the stuff required for two of us.

I started looking at used but had no luck. People wanted too much fro trailers that were ragged out and would need a lot of repair.

I finally saw an add at a new trailer dealer a few towns over that had a sale going. I went by and was able to get a really good deal on a 17' 7,000 lb load tilt bed. Nice looking trailer. Hooked it up to the Suburban and headed home. About 5 miles down I-82 I took an exit and went back to the dealer. at any speed over 60 the trailer would start whipping back and forth and it was nearly uncontrollable at 70. Dealer was very apologetic. They didn't have another one on the lot but said they could get another one for me the next day. Got a call from them that night and could out that particular trailer had a manufacturing flaw. The axle mounts had been installed incorrectly causing ALL of that particular brand/model to have the same tracking problem. Dealer was a stand-up guy so they replaced my 7K trailer with a 10K of a different brand no charge.

One thing I took away from this, though, is that 17' tilt-bed trailers are very tricky to design to get tracking and tilting right where a 19' is no issue at all. It also doesn't help when you have a car that is tail heavy like mine. Makes it even more difficult to get the correct tongue weight.

Oh - another thing. Even with a tilted my ground effects require me to carry "extenders" to allow it to clear the little wing ramps when loading and unloading. I imaging a splitter would make it even more difficult. My car is not particularly low. It's nearly 6" from the ground to the bottom of my air dam.

Share this post

Link to post

Share on other sites

I have a 17' tilt, no problems other than the car is almost too wide to fit on it, but that's my own fault.

For anyone else looking at these, particularly if you have a really low car, have a look at the "Texas rollback" trailer instead. I don't think they are much more expensive, if at all. On my car with 2" ground clearance to the splitter, I have to put spacers underneath the springs to lift the splitter to about 6" high and then use some 4' long 2x10s as ramps to get the car on.

Edited February 21 by JMortensen

Share this post

Link to post

Share on other sites

Understand. I actually double stacked some 2x10's, the bottom one 4' long and the top one 2' long to get my air dam clearance. I also duct taped some foam to the inside of the drivers side trailer fender to keep from banging it getting in and out. I also load the car a couple inches right of center to get enough room. I'm seriously considering putting hinges on the fender on that side so I can tip it out of the way when loading and unloading like the Uhaul car haulers.